Mightmare Cruel Liars
October was one of those weird months when most of the new releases didn’t really grab me, but there were three that will no doubt be in my rotation in the coming months.
Courtney Marie Andrews brought us Loose Future, with a somewhat brighter outlook than her previous record, Old Flowers. Produced by Sam Evian, the arrangements on this record are considerably more expansive than Andrews’ previous work, but without ever overshadowing the songwriting.
The month also saw the release of I Walked With You A Ways, the debut from the duo of Katie Crutchfield and Jess Williamson, who bill themselves as Plains. This is a record inspired by their mutual love for country music of the 1990s, and the record is steeped in those sounds. My own preference is for their more folk-flavored individual solo work (especially Crutchfield, who performs under the moniker Waxahatchee), but it is always interesting to hear artists you enjoy when they try something different.
Which brings me directly to October’s pick of the month, which is –and this is not a typo– Mightmare’s debut album Cruel Liars. Mightmare is the “band” name for the first solo effort from Sarah Shook (of alt-country’s bare-knuckled Sarah Shook & The Disarmers). Newly sober and coming off the release of The Disarmers’ third album, Nightroamer (see MotM, Feb. 2022), which was finished just before the Covid shutdowns, Shook spent the first year of the pandemic creating Cruel Liars almost entirely single-handedly, and the result could scarcely be more of a sonic departure. Swapping out foot-stomping honky-tonk licks for subtle synth textures, drum loops, and fuzzed out guitar lines, this is a pop record, through and through; only the occasional pronunciation of a word or phrase gives the faintest clue of Shook’s signature twang. I can’t say enough good things about it. Maybe you should just go listen to it. And spin up something by the Disarmers, too, while you’re at it.
Get some music in your ears, everybody!
